Margaret Wrinkle

Born and raised in Birmingham Alabama, Margaret Wrinkle is a writer, filmmaker, educator and visual artist. Her debut novel, Wash, reexamines American slavery in ways that challenge contemporary assumptions about race, power, history and healing. Published by Grove Atlantic, Wash has been short-listed for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the 2014 Chautauqua Prize, and it won an American Book Award and the Center for Fiction’s Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize. It was named a Wall Street Journal Top Ten novel of the year, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, an O Magazine selection for 10 Books to Pick Up Now, and a People magazine 4-star pick. Wrinkle earned a BA and an MA in English from Yale University, studied traditional West African spiritual practices with Malidoma Somé, and was awarded a residency at Hedgebrook. Her award-winning documentary broken\ground, made with Chris Lawson about the racial divide in her historically conflicted hometown, was featured on NPR’s Morning Edition and was a winner of the Council on Foundations Film Festival.